


New Terms

by delighted



Category: Hawaii Five-0 (2010)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Episode: s10e07 Ka 'i'o (DNA), Grief/Mourning, Love Confessions, M/M, Mild Smut, Road Trips, Sharing a Bed, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-27
Updated: 2019-11-27
Packaged: 2021-02-25 00:06:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,747
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21567508
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/delighted/pseuds/delighted
Summary: Grief is making Steve heavy. Not less substantial as it sometimes does to people, but more so. So much so that it feels to Danny like gravity itself has been altered. It’s not helping the feeling that he could get lost in this. But Danny’s so afraid of Steve getting lost... and he’s afraid of what that might mean for them both.
Relationships: Steve McGarrett/Danny "Danno" Williams
Comments: 52
Kudos: 295





	New Terms

**Author's Note:**

> “That bed’s big enough for two people, right?”
> 
> Kinda feels like Alex was literally asking for fic with that whole end scene.... I’m more than happy to oblige. But first a couple notes.
> 
> **Content:** This one’s pretty gloomy, guys. Key notes: drinking-to-numb-feelings, Danny remembering his brother, and references to 9-11. The end of course is hopeful and promising. But the story itself is pretty grey.
> 
> **Also please note:** I’m not caught up on the show, so even if I get something massively wrong in this because of that, just please please don’t tell me *anything* Thank you!

“I’m not sleeping on the couch.”

Danny mutters it softly to himself as Steve shuts the bathroom door. He wasn’t kidding about being exhausted. Of course nine tenths of that might have more to do with the dizzying swirl of his emotions than with his flight companion’s breathing habits. It’s not been an easy eight weeks, okay? 

_Shit_. To say the least.

He hears the shower turn on, figures Steve’ll be a while, figures he needs to metaphorically wash himself just as much as literally. Probably more. Flatters himself Steve’s able to do that now because Danny’s here. He’s not sure if that’s true. But he hopes. Hopes he’s been right in coming. Not that he had a choice.

Danny goes ahead and changes into sleep clothes and picks his side of the bed. It just happens to be the side closer to the door, not that he means anything inherently protective by that. But yeah, probably he does. Probably he’d put himself between Steve and a mosquito at this point. 

The bed is not bad for a hotel bed. The pillows are nice. Won’t take long till he’s out. 

Except. 

He’s remembering Matty. Has been since Junior told him about the money. And he knows this is different... and yet it’s not. It’s not understanding that money isn’t everything, and it sucks. It sucks and it hurts and it won’t ever not hurt, and he knows it. He knows Steve does as well.

He also knows Steve’s mourned the loss of his mother before. But this time it’ll be different. And Steve might think he knows what that’ll look like, but he doesn’t. He’ll be blindsided by it. He will be thrown by it, he’ll be taken off guard.

And he’ll _want_ that.

Probably that’s the real reason Danny came all the way to DC. Because he knew, Steve will want to hurt. Need to. Before he can go home. Danny just hopes Steve will still _want_ to go home after. And he’s terrifyingly uncertain of that. Which is probably why Danny didn’t trust him alone, not even for one night. He’s grateful Junior was so communicative about what the schedule would likely be. How long it’ll take before the CIA releases Doris’s body. How long Steve will be waiting, to take her home. How long Danny will wait with him.

Not that it matters. He’d wait with Steve forever. 

Danny’s mostly asleep by the time Steve climbs in... damp and smelling like hotel soap. He’s awake enough to register Steve’s stiffness, the rigidity that hasn’t left his body. The tension, still holding him up. (Holding him _together_ , more like.) But Steve’s stealthy side is in full effect, no accidental-on-purpose bumbling about to wake Danny, and he’s pretty sure it’s important that Steve thinks he’s asleep, so he keeps his breathing even, and doesn’t stir. He’s not honestly sure if he expects tears. But they don't come, and eventually shallow breaths deepen into almost relaxed ones, and only once he’s sure Steve’s soundly asleep does Danny allow himself to drift the rest of the way off. 

If his automatic, parenting-a-sick-child, light-sleep-mode kicks in... well, that’s probably to be expected. It doesn’t occur to him till just before he’s out that Steve didn’t hesitate before climbing into bed with him, and he’s too far gone to think if that means anything or not, but the notion settles somewhere deep in his heart, and it warms him.

He wakes twice. 

Once because he never sleeps well first nights away. His eyes adjust to the presence of the city lights, that stunning view of the Capitol, the sky that’s never fully dark, and maybe it soothes him. Maybe knowing, in the bodily way that’s still in his blood, knowing where he is, not just on some theoretical level, but in a deeper, more primal sort of way—he knows which way the ocean is here. And it’s the “right” ocean. He knows where the sun rises, first to greet the continental morning, first to start the day. He doesn’t feel left out or left behind, perpetually out of sync, so far away on the island that’s now his home.

Which is the thought that pushes his mind to the man next to him in bed.

There’d been a time. For a while. After Matty died. He’d justified it somehow as not wanting it in his house, not wanting his grief stuck between those four walls that were supposed to be about his _living_ family. Mostly, he’d simply not been able to be alone at night. (Of course, that’s why Steve doesn’t think anything of Danny sleeping on sofas.) But he’d woken more than once, those dark nights, to find Steve asleep on the recliner next to him. As though somehow he’d not been able to rest if he couldn’t be sure Danny was sleeping.

He knows the feeling. And probably that’s another chunk of the reason he’d needed to be here. Maybe it’s his parenting thing kicking in again. But he needed to be able to listen to Steve _breathe_. 

Yeah, hearing his voice had been... fuck. It’d been more than he’d.... Well, it’s not like he hadn’t been apart from him before. Shit. Just last year, with Joe. So yeah. Hearing Steve’s voice had done things to Danny’s heart he didn’t really want to face. But it had also activated this need, this compulsion, to be in the physical presence of his breaths.

More than that, though, more than just being in the room, he almost wishes.... 

There’d been several times when Grace was little—she’d been sick a lot as a baby, like Danny had been—and he’d more than once crammed himself in the crib with her. So that he could feel her breaths on his bare skin. Because it was literally the only way he could sleep some nights.

He almost feels that way now. 

Fortunately the hotel bed isn’t one of those “you could drop a bowling ball and the card tower wouldn’t collapse” beds. And he can feel enough movement from Steve to verify life without resorting to holding his arm out in front of his nose.

Because he would do it. Don’t think he wouldn’t.

(It’s possible the past eight weeks have traumatized him in some way. Wouldn’t that just be fitting.)

The second time Danny wakes is because of Steve.

He’s not thrashing so much as twitching. And Danny wants to reach out. Not to hold him down, still him, but to comfort him, _warm_ him. As though putting his warm hand on Steve’s anxious, chilled body would help. Seep comfort onto his skin, into his blood. Calm him, soothe him. 

Or maybe it just would help Danny. 

But he doesn’t. He doesn’t touch, doesn’t let himself move closer. Steve’s very carefully held himself apart from Danny. Not just in bed but before. In the room. And he knows there are layers of reasons why, and they’ve fallen asleep on the sofa next to each other often enough for Danny to know that Steve is not a distant sleeper. The man has no sense of boundaries. Certainly not when it comes to Danny. So it means something important that he’s very clearly not made contact with Danny tonight. And Danny isn’t going to be the one to shift that dynamic. 

So he doesn’t reach out, doesn’t try to still his partner’s movements. But he positions himself parallel as best he can without moving too much, without jostling Steve out of whatever nightmare he’s reliving, whatever trauma he’s processing. Danny knows it matters. He manages to mirror Steve. And maybe it’s the movement of the bed. Maybe it’s the change of breathing. But slowly Steve settles. And once he’s in a deeper sleep, Danny fades gently back into his own.

The purple dawn yawns over the picturesque view out the huge window. It’s hard not to feel like it’s taunting him. Torturing him. Reminding him it’s still very much the middle of the night back home.

The slip (being this close to Jersey and calling Oahu “home”) is one he wants to share with Steve. But the mood’s not exactly right for it. So he doesn’t.

He looks to where Steve’s sitting. In that chair again, facing the nation’s head, the seat of the governmental beast responsible in so many ways for the heartaches that have shaped him. 

Danny sighs. His stomach growls.

Which is no doubt the other reason Danny’d needed to come to DC.

After Matt had died, Danny’d not been very good about eating. Steve had realized this and started putting food in front of him on some sort of regular schedule. Danny’d eaten less than half of it. If that. But he remembers it helped. Even when he wasn’t able to choke any of it down. It had helped.

So he gets up, and he gets dressed. And Steve doesn’t move. Doesn’t acknowledge Danny’s presence. Which honestly is okay. Because at least he’s not trying to tell him to go away. Not trying to pretend he doesn’t need him, doesn’t _want_ him here.

There’s a Starbucks in the hotel. And it wouldn’t be Danny’s first choice for breakfast, but he hesitates to go further afield, especially without knowing what’s close. He hasn’t spent the night in DC since high school, and he’s pretty sure the breakfast options have changed a little since then.

He gets four breakfast sandwiches, one of each kind they have. Ordinarily he wouldn’t touch an egg white and spinach whatever, but there’s the slight possibility that something so ostentatiously healthy will guilt Steve into eating, so he braves it. He gets four coffees as well, but that’s partly because he’s sure he’ll at least need two. If one of them is secretly a mocha, well hopefully Steve won’t notice.

(Although Danny’d pay good money to have a Steve right enough in himself to give Danny a hard time about having too much sugar in the morning. He so would.)

Steve hasn’t moved. And he doesn’t move when Danny sets the white paper parcels of food in front of him. He does grab for the coffee Danny takes the lid off of so the smell wafts up and hits Steve’s senses.

That’s at least something. 

Danny sits across from him. His back to the wall (isn’t it just), legs in front of him, as if an easy posture is one thing he can do that helps. Which probably it doesn’t, because Steve seems only vaguely aware of his presence, but Danny knows body language matters, so he’s careful with his. He eats two of the sandwiches, drinks the mocha and half a plain coffee, and despite his better intentions, falls back asleep.

Steve’s in the same spot when he wakes again, but one of the wrappers is empty and the lid is off the second cup. There’s humidity in the air that speaks of a recent (and substantially longer than five Naval minutes) shower. Which prompts Danny to his own, and a fresh change of clothes. 

He’ll run out, if they’re very long waiting to escort Doris home. He won’t pretend he didn’t think of that, when he packed. Maybe part of him wanted the excuse. To see his own mother. Maybe most of him feels guilty about that. Feels so like he shouldn’t go home. Not when Steve is the reason he’s here. 

But Danny’s relationship with his mom isn’t complicated. And there’s still part of him that wants that, wants to sit at the kitchen table, let her feed him pancakes, let her fuss over him, stumble in her sweet, well-meaning way to try and make him feel better. He isn’t sure it won’t just make him feel worse. But he’s fairly confident the “clean” clothes Steve’s put on aren’t exactly military regulation clean, though they at least don’t have blood on them, which isn’t something he imagines Steve could say about most of his current wardrobe.

Still. He doesn’t dare leave Steve alone, he can feel that clearly. So he showers, probably actually close to those five standard minutes, picks out sweats and a tee and some bright orange socks with palm trees on them, and settles on the sofa to read.

It’s less unsettling than it otherwise might be, sitting in a perfectly quiet hotel room with a statuesque Steve in the middle of the room like he’s some kind of waypoint which to be honest it feels to Danny very much like he is. Danny’s whole life is in this room right now. And Steve’s point about _terms_ settles uncomfortably across his skin, because it’s not the kind of thing he’d have thought of Steve, without him mentioning it. Not that Danny takes life in stride. But the idea that he could somehow control any of it is so foreign a concept to him... it’s not easy to grasp that Steve’s only just now given in to the truth that life isn’t lived on terms set by those living it but by some inexorable twist of a sometimes very twisted fate.

The realization that Steve hadn’t ever really given up on Doris again being the mother he remembers hits Danny hard. 

That’ll make this so much harder on Steve. 

It’s a long day.

Sometime towards evening, Danny’s phone dings softly with a text from his mom.

_How’s Stevie doing, honey? Be sure and feed him even if he says he doesn’t want to eat. Let me know when I can bring you anything, or if you need me to come do your laundry or bring you both some fresh clothes_.

Danny holds his laugh in. Despite the differences, he and Steve really do have a lot in common with their mothers.

He texts back. Just a quick reply. Yes, Steve ate, no don’t come do laundry, I’ll come up soon and take care of it, and does dad know a good pizza place near the hotel?

It’s a few moments later (he’s imagined their conversation in the meantime—mom yelling across the house, asking dad if there’s good pizza in DC, dad yelling back his reply) he gets a text from his dad, and that says something. That his dad texted him the name and address and phone number of his choice for pizza in the nation’s capital, rather than just yell it back for his mom to send. 

Just so he could add _love, dad_. 

Danny’s grateful for the contact, even if it’s virtual. 

It helps. 

He orders pizza while Steve showers again. It’s as though regular immersion in water is essential to Steve’s coping. Even if it’s just tap water. Danny won’t complain if Steve showers every hour. If it helps. 

They sit, still in their separate spots, not together. They watch the end of some crime show on TV. Something melodramatic and unrealistic, with a bizarre ending that’s totally unsatisfying. 

Steve doesn't seem surprised when the pizza arrives. He opens beers and holds one out to Danny, like he’d done before. Like it’s the one thing he can think to do, to acknowledge that Danny’s sitting with him through this. 

They eat the pizza somberly, like it’s somehow symbolic. A ritual. Something normal in a place that’s not normal. A situation that is very far from normal. 

The pizza’s okay. It’s not great. “It’s better in Jersey,” he mutters. 

Steve doesn’t even smile. But he does eat.

That night Steve has three nightmares.

Each time Danny wakes with it, he’s prepared to jump. Out of bed to get out of the way, or the other way, to hold Steve still, he’s not sure which. But he trusts himself to react, to respond without thinking, and anyway, each time Steve stills before it gets bad enough that Danny feels pushed to act. 

By the third time, Danny’s adrenaline levels are too high for him to get back to sleep. So he curls on his side to watch Steve sleep, thinking maybe that knowing one of them is sleeping will be enough. 

Steve’s breaths stretch out, slow and even. But they’re studded with slight shivers Danny wouldn’t notice if he weren’t so close. He feels them almost as though they’re his own. They may as well be. They shake him to his soul. 

They slip easily into a routine. Spending their days at the hotel, waiting for the call. Trapped in a holding pattern. Held back from moving on. It’s a kind of purgatory, and in its own way it’s soothing. Mostly they spend their time thinking. Reading, resting, not talking unless they need to. Danny puts food in front of Steve. Sometimes he eats it. 

At night, though. At night they go out. Take public transit. They wind up at diners. They wind up at bars. And of course there’s too much drinking. And Danny’s been on both ends of that—the one who drinks too much and the one who watches, protects. With Matty lots of times, and with Adam, after Kono. And with Lou once or twice over the years. But never with Steve. With Steve it’s always been the both of them getting drunk. Together. 

Sometimes—rarely, but sometimes—they do it after a case gone bad. Quick, pragmatic numbing, followed by swift passing out and dreamless sleep. 

Usually, though, drunk Steve is happy-giddy-goofy Steve. “Whoopsie” Steve. Flirting-with-women (and yes sometimes with Danny) Steve.

This drunk Steve is different. This drunk Steve is morose. And philosophical. Like when Danny found him that first night. He’s not belligerent, but he’s bull-headed. And yet simultaneously somehow _soft_. 

He’s still and he’s deep and he’s needy, and it pulls at Danny in this really intense, driving way he knows he won’t be able to resist if Steve crosses a line. 

It happens one night in Bethesda. 

They’ve gone to a hole in the wall seafood place that serves the best soft shell crabs Danny’s ever had. Steve’s in one of his moods. He’s forcing himself to be his usual self, but it’s coming out all strained and awkward and aggressive. They leave the restaurant, and Steve turns, not back to the transit stop, but walking further towards the outskirts, and Danny starts to ask, but something in Steve’s step holds him back. 

Flickering neon flashes harsh in the otherwise dark night, and it’s a noisy cacophony of colors so Danny doesn’t see it till they’re at the door, those telltale rainbow stripes, and he stops abruptly when it registers, but Steve’s in full Op Mode, and catches it in the split second before he can say anything, and with what Danny can only call a growl, grabs at his hand and yanks him close. 

“ _Please_ ,” he hears, whispered, so close to the skin of his neck, Danny imagines he can feel the tantalizing bristles of Steve’s beard. 

Steve’s voice is quiet but it’s rough, it’s pleading, and yep, Danny knows in his bones he’s finally met that edge. So with a sense of the inevitable, with all the energy flowing only in that one direction, he takes a deep breath, and he steps over that line. 

It’s surprisingly easier than he’d imagined. 

“Yeah, of course,” he whispers back, giving Steve’s hand a squeeze to be reassuring, but he takes it as an offer, and holds on tighter, and somehow manages to not let go. Not while he buys them drinks, leaving the tab open, not while he downs a shot and a beer, not while he drags Danny out onto the dance floor and holds on like if he lets go, even for one moment, he’ll drown. 

They’re there for hours. Well into the night. Steve’s insistence, his intensity, doesn’t once let up. Every half hour he tops up with a shot and a beer, but his movement, his steadiness, remains constant. Danny has only a fraction of what Steve does to drink, and he’s swaying on his feet before long. Fortunately Steve maintains such a tight hold on him there’s no way he falters. 

The music’s throbbing, pulsing, the sort of elemental music that gets inside you. It’s meant to take you out of yourself, and ordinarily it works really well for Danny. He’d gone through a phase in college, of using music like this for escape. So he gets it. 

Only it’s different when someone’s body is pressed tightly against your own. Someone who ordinarily is out of reach. It’s easy to get lost in _that_ —get lost in what your relationship is, what it isn’t, what it could become. He feels those things start to tug at him. Thinks it’d be far too easy and far too dangerous to lose himself in it.

Still, he lets the music fill him. Hopes it’ll flood the other stuff out, if even just a little. And for a while, it does. For a while, it blocks everything out. 

Well, nearly everything. Steve’s pulse seems to affect him just as much as the music does. His physical presence threatens to overpower Danny. Grief (or not yet allowing his grief) is making Steve heavy. Not less substantial as it sometimes does to people, but more so. So much so that it feels like gravity itself has been altered. 

It’s not helping the feeling that he could get lost in this. Get lost in Steve. But he’s so afraid right now of _Steve_ getting lost... and Danny doesn’t dare risk getting dragged along with him. He’s done that before too, doesn’t dare do it with Steve. He’s too afraid of what that might mean for them both. 

When they finally leave the club, stepping out into the chill fall air, it all seems to catch up with Steve. It’s like he suddenly can’t tell which way is up. Danny knows they’ll never make it back to the hotel in DC like this, but he remembers there was one across from the station, and he thinks probably he can find that, so he wraps his arm around Steve and guides him there. 

He gets them a double queen room because sharing a king when it’s already there is one thing, but choosing it on purpose is another, and Steve conks out pretty much the instant his head hits the pillow, but Danny needs a shower, if only because it’ll let him breathe. And process. 

Even then, crawling into bed with a clean body and his less than clean smelling boxers and tee, he finds it impossible to imagine he’ll sleep. 

He runs through the utter tangle of sensations crammed in his head, of dancing with Steve. Things he hadn’t been able to think about all night, their bodies far too close together, moving as one in a way he doesn’t think he’s ever felt before, not with anyone. And he’s not sure if it’s down to their ten years long partnership, their bodily familiarity from cases and ops, from falling asleep against each other on the sofa back home, or from sleeping together here. It means more to him than it might at first seem, this coalescing, this rearranged version of those things. But it’s not like he didn’t in some sense see it coming. And it’s not as hard to puzzle out as maybe he thinks it should be.

Not much later, Steve gets up to piss and wash his face, and when he comes back, he throws his jeans and jacket on his bed, and instead climbs into Danny’s, pressing close against him, as though they’re still on the dance floor, all pretense of keeping apart nonexistent. He huffs out what sounds almost like a sob before passing out again. 

His breaths slow. Deepen. And Danny lets his follow. He doesn’t even notice when he falls asleep. 

The next day they rent a car. 

Steve drives, satellite radio tuned to classic rock. Santana. Stones. Floyd. They wind up in Annapolis. Steve’s old stomping grounds. He parks far off Main Street and they wander side streets, ducking into hidden pubs, ordering decent pints they drink and crappy bar food they don’t eat. Steve avoids the marina. Danny doesn’t question why. But he figures there’s too many memories, too many ghosts. It feels like Steve’s chasing them all. Maybe he is. Maybe it’s helping. Maybe it’s making it worse.

They sit on a deserted beach for what feels like hours. Letting the wind block their thoughts. Like the music the night before, it fills them. At least it’s something. 

Danny drives them back to DC. It’s late, but he goes out for food while Steve swims in the hotel pool. They eat in bed, watching a game from the ‘90s replayed on some sports history channel. 

Steve’s asleep by the time Danny crawls into bed after his shower, and he’s firmly on his side of the bed and stays there, until he wakes Danny in the night with a dream, whimpering “No, no, mom, no...” and Danny doesn’t resist—this time he can’t. 

He hesitates only for a moment over placement, but quickly settles his hand on Steve’s hip—not his arm, that might be fought off—resting it gently but firmly.

Steve calms. Sleeps. When Danny wakes a bit later, his hand is back at his own side, but Steve is closer. Not touching, but closer. 

He gets Danny up early in the morning. They drive back towards the coast. Across the Chesapeake this time. A highway above the water, suspended like magic. They drive through farmland. Cows. Crops. They stop at a farm stand. Drink fresh cold cider, eat hot, sugared, spiced donuts. There’s a dairy tour. Ice cream tasting. They don’t go, but they talk about it. Danny says Jersey cows are better. Steve doesn’t argue. 

They eat at a service stop on their way back. Fast food improperly mixed, tacos and fried chicken and coleslaw and hush puppies. They regret it, admit they’re too old for teenager food, but still it was good. 

Danny’s pretty sure Steve doesn’t sleep that night. He gets up. Paces. Stands at the window staring out into the too-bright night. Danny gets the sense Steve’s cursing the city. Cursing the plotting, the nefarious plans. The underhanded moves. The hurt it’s caused him. The loss. 

The next morning Danny makes Steve swim. Then _he_ drives. Leaves Steve’s classic rock playing. It seems to help. He heads them north this time, away from the sea. Old stone houses and narrow winding roads along rivers, beneath huge trees. They eat pancakes, browse shops selling old fashioned dry goods. Candles. Pickles. Preserves. Jelly. He buys some as gifts. For his mom, for the team. 

They stop for more beer to have in the room, order Chinese to be delivered, fall asleep on the sofa watching a black and white film he should remember but can’t. 

He wakes in the night with a crick in his neck and the thought he’d said he wouldn’t sleep on the couch. But Steve’s resting against him. And he’s sleeping better than he has so far, so Danny closes his eyes and forces himself to remain still. 

In the morning he takes too long in the shower. Can’t seem to move out of the too harsh spray of water he can’t get the right temperature so he leaves it too hot. He’s pink and stinging when he gets out, and he pulls on his last pair of clean underwear and thinks _it’s time to head home_. And that... it’s taken not very long. Before he switched back to Jersey being _home_.

Danny doesn’t tell Steve where they’re going, just lets him guess. There’s part of him that worries Steve will feel he has to play the perfect son at Danny’s house. If he doesn’t let him prepare, maybe he won’t try. 

She’s gone shopping for Steve, Danny’s mom has. He probably knew she would. Picked out stuff that’s frighteningly close to what Danny would. (If, you know, if he ever went clothes shopping for Steve. Not that he’s thought about it. Well not lately anyway.) Mostly charcoal and navy, an olive green tee that’ll really bring out his eyes. Subdued, sedate colors, soft fabrics. Zero cargo pants. Sweats and sportswear, but one nice pair of slacks, and a crisp baby blue dress shirt, almost like what Danny would wear. 

“I’m not saying we have to, but I thought we might go to Sammy’s tonight,” she says, as Danny fingers the fine fabric. She didn’t just go to the discount store. It’s making it hard for him to breathe. 

“I dunno, ma. He’s not been the best company lately. I don’t wanna push him.”

“Sometimes, baby, sometimes we need a little push. Just one night. We’ll pre-order the food, only be there an hour tops. But it might do him good.”

“I’ll ask.” 

He finds Steve sitting in the living room, going through a family photo album from the 80s. Danny’s hair makes him cringe. Steve’s almost smiling. 

“So there’s this place....” 

He tells Steve about their family’s favorite special occasion restaurant. His parents’ anniversary, times the kids did something they were proud of—Stella’s big role in the school play, Bridget’s win at cross country, Matty’s debate club victory. Danny getting in to Seton Hall. But also random Tuesdays just for fun. Fridays after a rough week. It’s simple, unadorned food. No fussy choices. Steaks and really good fries cooked in beef fat. Typical side salads and simple desserts. Ranch dressing but homemade. Classic chocolate cake, but better than a bakery. It’s Jersey. And it’s tradition. And his parents want to take Steve. 

The hesitant smile spreads further across Steve’s lips. It doesn’t reach his eyes, but Danny doesn’t expect it to. “Danny I’d love to.” And it sounds like he means it.

Steve still hasn’t shaved, Danny’s pretty sure he won’t till he’s got Doris home. But he cleans up nicely anyway, and the clothes Danny’s mom picked out suit him. 

Probably he’s watching Steve too closely. He’s most likely been doing it since he showed up at Steve’s hotel room door, and he’s just kind of thought maybe Steve hasn’t noticed. 

Of course Steve’s noticed. That beard might hide his lips but it doesn’t hide his eyes, and they’re trained on Danny now, like heat seeking missiles. “Danny, I’m fine.”

Danny bites back the rough laugh that tries to escape. “You’re not, and that’s okay, but thanks for doing this. It’s... kind of how they cope.”

Steve’s smile turns warmer, and he steps closer to Danny. Like he’s soothing _him_. Hands rub up and down Danny’s arms, and fuck why does that feel so good. 

“I like knowing where you get it from, buddy. I’m glad you brought us here, and not just for the clean clothes and the food. It’s _home_ , and I needed that right now.”

It’s the most he’s spoken in days, and partly it throws Danny. So he’s even more caught off guard when Steve pulls him into a hug. And yeah, okay, they danced. They’ve been sleeping together. But they haven’t hugged. Like somehow that’s too emotional. And a little too much emotion seeps out now, Danny feels it, feels the shudder go through Steve’s body just before he pulls back and visibly collects himself. 

Dinner’s actually really great. His dad ordered for them all in advance, so they sit and food is there almost instantly. And it’s cozy and familiar, the living-room-like space. The restaurant that feels more like a home than eating out. Steve isn’t his usual self, he’s not trying to be. But he’s open and he’s polite, and it seems like he genuinely enjoys being with Danny’s folks. For his part, Danny feels like a kid again. Those times he’d been allowed to bring a friend along to dinner. Or a girlfriend. 

They stay nearly two hours, and when they get home, his dad makes a fire in the living room fireplace. They have after-dinner drinks and stay up late talking. Mostly sports, because it’s safe, and they all follow football, all know how to talk it. It’s easy. But it’s nice. 

They finally head up to bed. Steve’s got Matt’s old room, Danny’s in his next door, and it’s their first time sleeping apart since this started, and Danny hates it. He gets up twice and checks on Steve. The first time he’s sleeping almost peacefully. The second time, his bed’s empty. 

He finds Steve at the kitchen table. Cold cup of tea in his hands, staring at it like it might contain the answers to the universe if only he knew how to look. Danny holds out his hand. Steve meets his eyes. For the first time, really meets his eyes. And he takes his hand, and he stands. And Danny leads him down the half flight of stairs to the family room, closing the door behind them. He turns on the TV, just mindless middle of the night crap, and he sits in the middle of the huge sectional sofa. Steve hesitates, but Danny pulls on his hand till he sits next to him. They sit there like that, hands still tightly together, just like they had been at the club. It takes maybe ten minutes, but Steve starts slowly to cry and once he does, it’s not long before it’s coming in sobs that shake his body like they might shake him apart. 

Words flow through Danny’s mind. Words like _get it out_ , and _it’s not good to hold it in_ , and _it’s okay to cry_ , and _you’ll feel better after_. He says none of them out loud. They never help. Usually they make it worse. 

Steve lets go Danny’s hand to wipe his eyes. Danny doesn’t offer a tissue, doesn’t smooth his hand over Steve’s back when he collapses forward, head resting in his hands as his whole body heaves again with his crying. 

It takes a long time, but the sobs slow, and eventually stop. When Steve falls almost incidentally against Danny, it’s as though he simply can’t hold himself up any longer—as though he’s given up trying to control, let go his restraint. Easing himself down, he’s aware now of where he is, lets his head come to rest in Danny’s lap, grabs for Danny’s hand and holds it to his face. It takes a while for Danny to realize Steve’s kissing his palm. Holding it to his eyes like it’s a compress. Danny brings his other hand up and rests it against Steve’s scalp. Fingers rub lightly through his too-long hair, savoring the texture, the fullness. Steve leans into the contact, holds his hand more tightly, so Danny strengthens his touches. Slow, firm, even movements. Almost as though he’s gentling him to sleep. 

Eventually, it works.

Danny stays awake. Keeps his hand moving for as long as he can. Lets it finally rest when he just can’t anymore. His other hand is still on Steve’s face. He can feel the soft puffs of his breath. 

His own tears come then. Silent ones, no wracking of his body, just a flood that streams down his cheeks, dripping onto his shirt, soaking it through. When they stop, he lifts his hand and pulls up his shirt to wipe his eyes. Then he tangles his fingers back in Steve’s hair, and he sleeps.

There’s coffee cake and bacon in the morning. And eggs and fruit. She’s packed them food to take back. And a lunch in case he wanted to do a picnic. At a park maybe. He knows what she’s getting at, can’t decide if it’s a good idea or bad, but in the end some inner part of himself decides for him because he drives not even thinking, and they end up in the parking lot at Liberty State Park. 

Steve sits in the car, anger radiating off him, and Danny’s not surprised. He’s had his own moments of sitting here, this view that means so much good and so much bad at the same time. There’s no black and white in this place any more. Only shades of blood and hate and hurt and sacrifice. So fucking much sacrifice. 

They get out and walk along the water. Looking towards the City, looking towards the giant green lady, standing tall no matter what.

“It’s really hard to love my country right now,” Steve says. Looking out at the river. But probably not seeing New York. Probably seeing Mexico. 

Danny knows. He doesn’t see the skyline as it is. He only ever sees it burning. 

“That’s okay,” he says. “You don’t have to.”

They drive away, and they don’t look back. Danny takes them to a park that has no meaning except that Bridget fell here as a child and lost her first tooth. They sit on the swings and they talk about baby teeth and strep throat and getting their tonsils out. 

“They don’t do that anymore,” Danny says. There’s a lot they don’t do anymore. 

That night Steve has another nightmare. 

This time it’s worse. This time Danny has to wake him. He can’t stand it, can’t physically bear the sound of Steve’s cries, his whimpers, his moans. 

“It’s this dream about mom,” he whispers, when he’s finally out of it, sucking down the shot of whiskey Danny’s forced on him. “This stupid thing where I’m a kid again and she’s reading to me, but she won’t listen. I keep telling her I don’t care about the money I just want her home. But she can’t hear me.”

Danny offers him another shot but he refuses. Danny takes it instead. Steve’s staring at him. Eyes red but dry. 

“All I wanted was my mom back.”

“I know.”

Steve takes the bottle and the shot glass from Danny. He sets them on the side table. He gestures for Danny to lay back, and once he is, once he’s settled, Steve nestles at Danny’s side. Rests his head on Danny’s chest. Grabs for his hand, places it on his head. Then rests his own hand against him. Fingers trailing against his collarbone, fingering the worn neck of his sleep shirt, brushing against mere millimeters of bare skin. It doesn’t make Danny shiver, but only because it takes all his effort not to. 

_She never was_ , Danny wants to say. Wants to point out Steve’s not just mourning her death, but the loss of who she never was. He knows that’s sometimes harder. Knows Steve’s not ready to hear it. 

He wakes to bristly beard nuzzling at his neck. And his first vaguely coherent thought is _huh, that’s nicer than I thought it might be_ , which is followed swiftly by _fuck_. He’s got himself enough in Thinking First Of Steve mode that he doesn’t push him off, doesn’t startle. He pulls himself to full awareness, fights against his sleepy desire to just let it happen, to just give in to what he’s increasingly unable to deny is what he wants anyway. Probably always has wanted. 

Steve smells nice, okay? And it’s not just the soft creamy goats milk soap he picked up in that country store. Steve always smells nice. And Danny’s not such an idiot that he doesn’t know there’s chemistry at work there. Actual chemistry. That some part of his being recognizes Steve as something desirable. Something his body wants. Something _he_ wants. 

But the whole Grief Makes Us Do Stupid Things thing is real. It’s very damn real. Danny knows. He’s been on both ends of that one too. 

He’s _not_ doing that with Steve.

Still, he doesn’t want to upset the cart. And he has no idea how aware Steve even is of what he’s doing. It’s possible he’s in some weird, half-asleep, searching for comfort, automatic pilot thing. Or maybe he’s just so hurt, he’ll do anything. Danny’s been there, too.

To test it, and only to test it, Danny starts to rub his fingers lightly in Steve’s hair. He tells himself it’s a precursor to pushing Steve gently away. Holding him back. Problem is, he does neither. Because Steve groans at the contact, and yeah, that gives Danny his answer. At least he thinks it does. 

Steve lifts up, levers himself over Danny, looks down at him. 

“ _Please don’t say no_.”

His voice is so jagged, Danny wonders if he was up crying more in the night and Danny just didn’t wake for it.

He has to shut his eyes. Squeezes them so tight it hurts. Manages to shake his head. Barely. 

But Steve sees it. He collapses against Danny in a way that gives him away—he knows Danny’s right. But it also gives something else away, because Steve gives in to a frustrated thrust of his hips against Danny’s side where he lands. And Danny’s breath, before he can stop himself, catches on a needy gasp at the hardness there, the fullness, swiftly matched with his own.

The sound propels Steve up again, on his elbows. Enough to capture Danny’s lips in his bristle-lined mouth. 

“Need you so much,” Steve pants when he stops, then dives back in. 

Danny wants to resist. Knows he should, knows he needs to. But he can’t. He’s overwhelmed by sensation, and he’s been holding back from this for so long. And taking that step, over that line—which was so tenuous in the first place it was barely even a line anymore—has thrown his morals, his sense of right and wrong, his compass, all out of whack. And he _wants_ this. So much it hurts. So much it’s starting to blend horribly with _need_. Like he can’t tell which is which anymore. And he gives in, almost all the way in, for some absolutely glorious amount of time, he gives in. 

And then icy awareness breaks, and he pushes Steve off. 

“Babe,” he rasps out, throat gone raw inexplicably. Suppressed emotion breaking through no doubt. 

Steve is looking away. Hand to his face. His posture is slumped. His chest is heaving. “God, Danny. I’m so sorry.”

Danny doesn’t reply. He can’t—he’s warring with himself over his desire to _keep going_ mixed with the absolute certainty that Now is Not the Time. After too long a beat, during which he’s terrified that Steve is starting to panic, Danny can’t hold himself back from reassuring Steve. He scrambles over the bed to where Steve’s sitting, and tugs on him till he turns around. When he does, Danny pulls him into a kiss so fierce it actually hurts. Then he shoves Steve away again, but gently this time. 

“Just so it’s clear I want this,” he says softly. “But we can’t do this right now. If we do and we regret it... we’ll never forgive ourselves.”

Something shifts in Steve’s eyes, as Danny explains. It’s almost like they clear. As though they’d been clouded and now they’re not. 

“ _I could never regret you_ ,” he whispers. 

Danny replies by kissing Steve again, which of course is a mistake, because within milliseconds Steve’s got him on his back, pinning him down and holding his gaze with the most fierce expression Danny’s ever seen on his partner’s face. 

“Tell me _no_ , right now, or I’m not stopping till you know that I’m not just messing around with this.”

“ _Steve_....” Danny’s never been so conflicted. Every part of him is pulled towards Steve. Every inch of his body longs to be touched, taken apart, claimed. But his mind, his soul, is screaming _no, not like this, this way lies regret and hurt and resentment_.

It’s enough. 

Steve sits back. “Yeah.” He says. “I know. You’re right.”

It’s like the tension’s been cut. Like all the electricity’s gone out of the room. 

They sit there breathing for a long time, and it’s weird, but Danny can feel it, something has shifted. 

“Eight weeks, babe,” he whispers into that stillness. “Eight. Weeks.”

Steve startles at that, and he turns to face Danny as though he’s suddenly seeing something new.

“You didn’t think....”

Danny shrugs. It’s the same shrug he gave way back when this all began. The same goddamn shrug. Because he’s honestly not sure. Did he? Did he ever truly think, in those long eight weeks, that Steve had actually died? There were nights he woke in a cold sweat, terror gripping his chest, unable to breathe. There were whole days he felt stuck inside a cloud—unable to think, unable to listen, unable to function. Tani’d sent him home at least twice. Adam had benched him on no fewer than three ops. And Lou had started just bringing two lunches after Danny’d repeatedly forgotten his own. Junior hadn’t commented. But then, Junior had started his insane quest to find Steve, so in retrospect that had been his own way of coping. 

The thing is. Danny’d had that dumb thing people get. The one where they convince themselves that somehow they’d know.... And it was naive of him, he knew, because he _hadn’t_ had it with Matty, and if there was anyone he should have known had died, surely it was his brother. But he hadn’t. So it didn’t make sense, and he knew it. But it hadn’t ever seemed to him like the world had stopped having Steve in it. 

He’s not sure he can explain any of that to Steve though. Maybe some day.... But not now. 

Steve’s not apologizing though. Far from it. It looks very much like he’s struggling with his own potential confession. 

“Spit it out babe,” Danny says, as he gets up to put the hotel coffee maker on. He won’t drink it, but the smell might at least help his brain function. He’s desperate for coffee, if he’s honest. But probably they have a good bit of talking they shouldn’t just shove back under the rug. 

“I... uh. I know I shouldn’t have expected it, but I.” Steve pauses on a sigh so heavy Danny thinks it must actually hurt. “I wanted your blessing. For the mission. I wanted to know you thought I was doing the right thing.”

Danny’s grimace is sideways, pinched. “What did I say to you?” He tries to say it kindly. It comes out far too harsh. 

“You said I had to do what I had to do.”

“Babe.”

“What, Danny.”

“It _was_ a blessing. It was... I knew you had to do it, of course there was no choice. But you can’t expect me to have _liked_ it.”

The look on Steve’s face clearly states that yeah, he had wanted Danny to like it. 

He wants to laugh. “ _You_ didn’t even like it, Steven.”

“That’s why I needed you to.”

Danny isn’t fast enough to bite back the too-harsh laugh. But he swallows the end of it, and nearly chokes. “You’re kidding me, right?”

“I’m not. I needed to know... that it was okay with you. That.... I don’t know. I just. I needed to not go, thinking... that you didn’t want me to.”

“Jesus Christ, Steven! Of course I fucking didn’t want you to go. 

“But you said....”

Danny shrugs again. Because what the fuck else was he supposed to have said? 

“Well then why?”

“What should I have done, huh?” 

“Told me not to go.”

And that stops his heart. “Would you have stayed?” It’s barely a whisper. 

“No.”

Danny’s heart restarts. “No of course you wouldn’t have. You didn’t have a choice. There was never any choice.”

“No. But it would have been nice to know.”

“For what it’s worth,” he says, and he’s given in, he knows. Just fuck it all. There’s no point anymore. “For whatever it’s worth, I never want you to leave.” 

And there’s room there, for different interpretations. But Steve doesn’t falter even for one second. He’s got Danny in his lap and Danny’s shirt off over his head somehow in one smooth movement, and his tongue is down his throat at the same time his hand is down his pants, and there’s not honestly a lot Danny’s aware of after that. He’s aware that it feels different, sex with your best friend, hands that have been inside your chest, hands that have defused bombs, hands that have pulled you back from the edge, now push you towards it.

At first Danny struggles, wants to give as much as get. But Steve needs this. Needs to be able to _do_ something. Have an impact on someone. Danny gets that implicitly, almost right away, that first time Steve stops his attempt at taking some control. So he lets him. Lets Steve have his way, and more than that, he gives himself completely over to it. 

It’s not that hard to do. 

Steve kisses along his collarbone. Runs his fingers across his hips. Sucks and bites and licks across every inch of Danny’s skin. Digs his fingers into the dimples at his back. He lowers himself in Danny’s lap, with a very different purpose in mind this time. Swallowing him down in one inevitable gulp, only pulling back at the last possible moment to take his own shirt off and tug Danny on top of him so he can feel the soft warmth of him fall onto his chest, eyes glazed as though it means too much. 

Even then, when Danny recovers and moves to take the rest of Steve’s clothes off, Steve doesn’t let him. He just pushes him back on the bed and begins again, rubbing his chest, and Danny’s spend on it, against him, lost to the sensations, lost to the emotions, lost to it all. 

In a way. In a very real, tangible way, it’s the most power Danny’s ever had. In giving all his up to Steve, he’s very aware of the effect it’s had—of giving all of Steve’s to Danny. 

When finally Steve lets Danny take over, he’s more pliable, more submissive than Danny ever would have imagined possible. It feels, stupidly—and he nearly hates the thought—but it feels a little bit like he’s tamed Steve. Purely by letting him take what he needed? By letting him expend something of his frustration, his pent up need to fix, to save, to rescue.... Maybe it seems slightly odd, but Danny has a feeling it’s pretty accurate. 

Steve has worn himself out, Danny worries. He himself is caught somewhere between buzzing and sapped, and damn but it's a heady, seductive feeling. Which possibly is why his approach, when he does approach Steve, is so very different from his normal bedroom behavior. Of course there is the distinct probability that it’s something to do with it being _Steve_ , after all. 

After all this time....

He goes slow—Danny often goes slow, he likes to savor. But he goes... deeper, as well. And it’s difficult to convey, but it’s as though he’s existing, for this moment, actually on a different plain. Something somewhat sideways from normal life. Heightened, yes. Slowed (surreally so), of course. But something more, as well. The smells—his smells, and Steve’s, they’re combining, and it creates this entirely novel thing, and Danny’s had a good bit of sex in his life thank you, and he considers himself something of a connoisseur of the finer sensations of the act. But this. This is something altogether new to him, and he can’t get enough. 

When Steve finally comes, it’s surprisingly muted. More like a long, slow flooding out of him than an intense, shuddering pulse. It fascinates Danny, and he watches Steve’s face fade into the closest thing to peace he’s seen on it in longer than he can remember. He’s asleep within seconds, but Danny’s too delighted by that to even begin to be upset. Carefully, gently, and utterly in awe, Danny cleans them both up, then he eases himself in at Steve’s side and if he thinks to himself that it just feels right... well that’s probably because it is.

They wake later in the morning when they finally get the call. The CIA is releasing Doris’s body. 

They can take her home. 

Danny expects Steve to be relieved the wait is finally over. He expects Steve to be angry it took so long. He expects Steve to not want to go, to need something more. Something else. Some better resolution. 

He doesn’t expect what he gets. Which is a Steve who won’t let him go. Who wants to hold his hand, wants to sit with their legs touching, keeps putting his hands in Danny’s pockets, keeps kissing the side of his neck, as though touching Danny has somehow become linked with his ability to breathe. 

Maybe it has. Danny’s pretty sure his heart works better when Steve is touching him. 

They linger. Just for a moment. Looking out one last time at the seat of the nation’s government. Seeing the buildings perhaps for themselves at last, and not what they symbolize. 

Steve turns to look at Danny. His hesitation is written so clearly on his face. He doesn’t need to ask it. Danny knows the question.

“There is one thing we can have on our terms, babe.”

“We’re not getting pizza from Jersey to take on the plane, buddy.”

“Okay, that’s not where I was going with that, but hang on, why not?”

Steve chuckles, and god help him, Danny thinks it’s the best dang sound he’s heard in weeks.

“I meant this,” he says, stepping mere inches closer so he’s tucked inside Steve’s embrace, up against that chest that so recently rubbed deliciously against his own. “Us. Together. Our terms.”

Steve grins, and he captures Danny’s lips with his and then he whispers “Can we please get out of this hotel?”

“Ready to go home?” Danny asks, softly.

“Ready to go anywhere with you,” comes the reply.

It’s not as much as he’d hoped for but it’s more than he imagined he’d get, so for a start, it’ll do. 

It’s somehow simultaneously weird and fitting that they fly home on a commercial flight. Ordinary citizens. Taking a loved one home to be buried. Danny’s glad his dad made him get the upgrade to first class, because once they take off, Steve lifts the arm rest, settles the blanket over them both, finds Danny’s hand with his, and sleeps the whole way. 

He goes to his house once. Brings back most of his clothes. They fit easily in Steve’s sparsely populated closet. He actually does go shopping for Steve after that. And not just because he knows—this is one funeral Steve’s not wearing his dress blues for. 

Adam and Lou take care of the food the day of the funeral. At Steve’s. At the house that had once been hers too. It’s nice to fill it with friends. It helps, Danny hopes, to flood out some of the painful memories that paint the walls. Far too literally. 

Once everyone’s gone, they sit out on the sand. Not in their chairs. On the sand. In their black suit trousers, crisp white shirts, black ties undone, bottles of beer at their sides. And Danny leans against Steve in the growing dark, Steve’s arm possessively, territorially, around him, and he imagines a very different scenario, dressed in nice clothes, on the beach, friends and family near. 

It’s a thought he tries to stop himself from having, it just doesn’t seem right. But the harder he tries to block it, the more insistent it becomes. So he gives in to it. And it’s stupidly nice—kind of like the way it’s always comforting when there’s a baby at a funeral. So he lets himself get lost to it, and when Steve notices he’s drifted off in his musing and asks what he’s thinking about, Danny tells him. He can’t stop himself, though he thinks he should try, but he can’t, he just tells him. 

Steve’s only answer is to pull him closer and whisper “ _Good_.”

Mary and Joanie are upstairs, getting ready for bed, so Steve takes Danny to the garage, and they make out in the Merc. 

Which is a lot nicer than he’d have thought. 

He jokes that the last time he got a blowjob in a car he was a teenager, and Steve takes it as a challenge. 

By the time they tip toe silently upstairs, the girls are asleep.

Danny goes back to work on Monday. Steve... doesn’t. He convinces Mary and Joanie to stay for another week. They surf and they go on picnics, and they have movie night, and Danny knows. Steve’s trying to be a family anyway. Without mom. He’s trying to fill a role no one ever did. Trying to make them be the family he wanted. The family they never were. 

Danny’s not sure it works. He _is_ sure Steve knows it. 

For a while Danny thinks maybe Steve really won’t go back to work. And for a while he doesn’t. Danny contemplates scenarios he never thought he’d imagine. Maybe Steve needs an adventure, maybe they need to get away somewhere, away from anyone needing anything from Steve, away from anyone trying to control his life. Just them and the sea. And it says something, it says probably a lot, that Danny doesn’t cringe from that like he absolutely once would have. There’s actually a part of him that wants it. 

But the thing is. Running away won’t fix this. It never solves any of it. Because it wouldn’t be Five-0 or the CIA or Oahu that Steve would be running from. It would be himself. And yes, sometimes leaving to find ourselves works. But most of the time we come back to find we were there all along. 

So Danny waits. He doesn’t push Steve, and he doesn’t let any of the others push either. He gets nervous. But he calms himself. And he waits. 

And one day, one random day that doesn’t seem to be any different from any other day, Steve gets dressed when Danny does. And he puts on his badge. And he grabs his gun. But when Danny holds out the keys, Steve just smiles. 

“Nah,” he says, kissing Danny gently. “It’s your turn to drive.”

Danny squints at him. Almost wants to check his pulse, check his temperature. 

But then he thinks he gets it. 

“New terms?” He asks.

“Something like that,” Steve says, and he gets in the Camaro, leaving the driver’s seat for Danny, with a smile on his face that reaches his eyes.


End file.
